Jonathan Rea heads into Superpole as the tentative favourite for pole position after moving to the top of the timesheets during second qualifying at Imola.

In what proved a fairly static session with only minor improvements coming from the riders, Pata Honda's Rea would slide less than a tenth beneath Tom Sykes's provisional marker with just over five minutes remaining to emerge on top.

Indeed, despite failing to improve on his Friday best, Sykes remained in second place, just 0.013secs behind his countryman, ahead of Italian quartet Davide Giuglliano, Michel Fabrizio Marco Melandri and Ayrton Badovini.

With the satellite Aprilias well inside the top five, the factory pairing of Sylvain Guintoli and Eugene Laverty endured a quiet start to their day by only managing seventh and eighth respectively, with Leon Camier and Chaz Davies completed the top ten.

Despite six riders failing to improve on their lap times, there was no change in the order further down the field, with Federico Sandi, Vittorio Iannuzzo, Noriyuki Haga and Alexander Lundh each missing the cut to make it through to Superpole.

Following a respectable return to action on the Grillini BMW on Friday, Haga's Saturday started poorly when he suffered a tumble at Tamburello, which in turn saw him slip behind his team-mate on the timesheets. He will start 18th on the grid.

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